The Bulgarian waitress shakes her head. It takes me a few moments to remember that here, this means yes.She is going to get us another beer. I’m sitting in Angelina’s restaurant in the Bulgarian mountain town of Etropole. Yesterday, under a hot Bulgarian sun sitting in a crystal sky, my cousin Michael married his beautiful bride Millena in a tiny chapel in the nearby village of Boikovets.
The orthodox minister chanted in Bulgarian, with Millena’s mother Mariana occasionally chipping in with English translations, a role she reprised 
several times during the day as everything down to the speeches are carefully translated into the other language. It was a day Pimms and local wine, of Bulgarian dancers and late night disco, of wedding cake and shopska salad. A truly bilingual, bi-cultural wedding unlike any other.
Tonight, the two waitresses in Angelina’s have been running around all evening catering to our every whim, but as we prepare to leave they are incredibly happy. Our party of 24 eating tonight have rounded up the bill giving them a tip of around £50 (US$100) between them, a small fortune by local standards.
Leave a Reply
